Residents in Northport, Tuscaloosa, county complain about door-to-door salesmen

Wednesday

Aug 21, 2013 at 12:20 AM

Law enforcement authorities say they have received complaints about aggressive door-to-door book salesmen in recent weeks.A group of college students from Estonia has been in the area selling educational books this summer.

By Stephanie TaylorStaff Writer

Law enforcement authorities say they have received complaints about aggressive door-to-door book salesmen in recent weeks.A group of college students from Estonia who work for Southwestern Advantage, a Nashville, Tenn., company, has been in the area selling educational books this summer.Their questions unnerved many residents, according to law enforcement.“The biggest concerns were caused by questions like 'Do any kids live here' and 'Where do other kids in the neighborhood live,' ” said Tuscaloosa County Sheriff's Office Chief Deputy Ron Abernathy. “These were legitimate concerns. They were, I'm sure, looking at it from a marketing standpoint.”An investigator with the department contacted the company to relay that the sales tactics were causing concern, Abernathy said. Company representatives responded Aug. 16 that the students would be transferred from the area in upcoming days.Residents in Tuscaloosa, Northport and Tuscaloosa County have all called police and reported that the salesmen were too pushy. “We've had a couple of complaints about their aggressiveness,” said Sgt. Brent Blankley, a Tuscaloosa police spokesman.Southwestern Advantage was established in 1855, according to its website, and began a summer program to assist young men with college tuition in 1868. Foreign students have come to the area to sell books for several years. They have a permit to conduct door-to-door sales in Tuscaloosa, but not in Northport. A few people who live near the Clear Creek area called police on July 26 to report overly aggressive sales representatives, said Lt. Keith Carpenter, a Northport police spokesman. The young men did not have a permit to work in Northport, he said. One of them visited the Police Department the next day and spoke with Carpenter, who told him they needed to obtain a proper license.“We haven't had any calls about them since then,” he said.A company representative posted on the Tuscaloosa County Sheriff's Office's Facebook page on Thursday.“We are working closely with the students in this area to ensure that they are being polite and transparent about who they are and what they are doing, just as they were trained to do,” the representative wrote in the post.The students live with host families and visit communities in many American states. News reports from Midwestern states including Oklahoma and Missouri indicate that the sales reps have caused similar suspicion from residents there. Social media activity has spread across the country that the booksellers were targeting young girls for sex trafficking. The story had spread so much that snopes.com, the website that investigates urban legends and Internet rumors, posted an entry on Aug. 8 that included emails that have circulated this summer. All of the law enforcement agents said that the public should contact authorities if they feel uncomfortable with any door-to-door sales representative.“We want to be on the front end of any situation that arises,” Abernathy said.